Disasters, Mental Wellbeing and Disability

The public forum Disasters, Mental Wellbeing and Disability – Promoting Resilience for All will be held on 28 November 2014. It will explore how to integrate mental health and disability issues into disaster risk management, drawing on experiences from Japan and other countries. Speakers from several UN agencies and other organizations will address this challenge in relation to norms and standards, institutional arrangements, governance and practice. In particular, the event will discuss how the process to formulate a global post-2015 framework for disaster risk reduction (DRR) can incorporate issues of mental wellbeing and disability.

The event will be organized by UNU in partnership with the National Information Center for Disaster Mental Health, Japan.

As well as being critical public health problems, mental wellbeing and disability related to disasters also constitute serious challenges to human security. Research has revealed a high incidence of mood and anxiety symptoms as well as suicidal ideation among inhabitants in areas affected by disasters. Nevertheless, mental wellbeing and disability have often been neglected in international discussion and policy processes related to disasters. Greater attention must be focused on these issues, and doing so will play an important role in building resilience to disasters.

Andrew Mohanraj (Chairperson, National Council for Persons with Disabilities in Malaysia)Experience from the Indian Ocean Tsunami and the Typhoon Haiyan: Importance of including mental well-being and disability

Florante E Trinidad (National Professional Officer, WHO Office of the Representative in the Philippines)Best practices and lessons learned: WHO response to mental well-being and disability in the disasters in Philippines and its inclusion in DRR policy and programmes

Akiko Ito (Chief, Secretariat for the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, UN DESA)How to include persons with disabilities in disaster risk reduction

16:10–17:00 Discussion

17:00 Closing

Registration

Please click on the REGISTER button above to access the online registration page.

* * * *UNU-IAS is co-organizing this event as part of the Fukushima Global Communication Programme, a research initiative examining impacts of the Great East Japan Earthquake, tsunami and nuclear accident of March 11, 2011 on people and society, the challenges of the recovery process in Fukushima, and related issues of risk and information provision.